The Daily Grasshopper

I recently began one of these essays with the "Predictable Headline of the Day," and it's time to revive the feature as Saturday's Boston Globe gave us another penetratingly obvious story caption. There, accompanied by a large color photo of the two men regarding each other across the arm's length of space separating their adjoining White House podiums, we find the following headline: "Bush, Blair display unity."

No kidding. Until very recently, when the U.S. (through the usual bribes and arm-twisting) persuaded a handful of former Eastern bloc nations to join the Bush/Blair juggernaut, the only other people backing this farce of a war were the oil companies (the U.S. ones, that is) and the weapons dealers (all of them - they know no allegiance, nor shame). The Boston Herald has a "Photo Caption for Dummies" under its Page One photo of Bush and Blair's White House love-in, too: "ALLIES: President Bush, right, and British Prime Minister Tony Blair appear at a joint news conference yesterday." Allies? Gee, who'd have thunk it?

Now, this kind of frank talk about the decision by the world's most recent global Imperial superpower to hitch its wagon to the star of the world's reigning Imperial superpower might get me in some hot water with Bill O'Reilly, apparently. You see, in his syndicated column, which ran in Saturday's Herald, the host of Fox News Channel's "The O'Reilly Factor" stated that people who believe that the U.S. government has committed acts of terrorism are - get ready - "anti-American." You can read the article on his website:

http://www.billoreilly.com/currentarticle

Of course, no sooner do I write an essay claiming that Noam Chomsky can't get any ink than his name shows up in the op-ed page of the Herald. O'Reilly, calling Chomsky a "well-known radical," goes on to pillory a group of celebrities who put their names on an anti-war ad that ran in the New York Times the other day. O'Reilly writes that the ad copy read "We too watched with shock the horrific events of September 11, 2001. We too mourned the thousands of innocent dead and shook our heads at the terrible sce4nes of carnage - even as we recalled similar scenes in Baghdad, Panama City and, a generation ago, Vietnam."

This is beyond the pale for O'Reilly, who makes a bit of a jump to the conclusion that the ad's signers are "equating the terrorist attack on Sept. 11 with the United Nations' mandated removal of Saddam Hussein from Kuwait and the arrest of the drug-dealing dictator of Panama, Manuel Noriega." You'll notice he very conspicuously leaves out any defense of the U.S. government's actions in its war in Vietnam. The classified documents on that war have been opened, and the question of whether some of the U.S. forces in Indochina engaged in acts of terror has been conclusively answered in the affirmative.

But O'Reilly wants to wrap himself in the flag and insist that the liberation of Kuwait and the capture of Noriega are just two more shining examples of the United States' supreme benevolence and generosity to the rest of mankind. Let's take a closer look at some of the actual facts, shall we? Because O'Reilly concludes his article by saying "Saying that the United States committed terrorism in the Gulf War and Panama is outrageous and foolish. It is also anti-American."

I can deal with being called anti-American. As far as I can tell, the Super Bowl halftime show epitomizes what it means to be an American these days, and I'm happy to let Bill O'Reilly know that Shania Twain doesn't speak for me. And I haven't watched a single episode of the Osbournes or Joe Millionaire, leaving me to wonder if I even qualify as an American at this point. So, again, I can live with being called anti-American by the likes of Bill O'Reilly. But foolish? Mr. O'Reilly - mama didn't raise no fool.

Let's take the U.S. military's actions in Gulf War I. Already I've written about the use of Depleted Uranium weapons - potentially a war crime under the Geneva Convention. So, right off the bat, we're looking at a very questionable record. Then there's the "turkey shoot" near Basra on March 2nd, after the war had been declared over. Never heard of it? If so, let me just say that it didn't get a whole lot of coverage on CNN back in the day. And you didn't see Tom Brokaw gazing thoughtfully into the TV camera telling you about how U.S. troops fired thousands of rounds of ammunition into the backs of retreating Iraqi soldiers. But the firsthand accounts of these atrocities exist, and they raise troubling questions about our military's actions.

You can read a copy of journalist Seymour Hersh's "Overwhelming Force," from the May 22, 2000 edition of the New Yorker, here:

http://www.polyconomics.com/sy.html

Here's a report on some of the allegations from a mainstream journal:

http://www.library.cornell.edu/colldev/mideast/irqrep.htm

And General McCaffrey's response:

http://www.fas.org/news/iraq/2000/05/000515-iraq-usia01.htm

In Panama, you had reports of similar atrocities. More than a thousand civilian deaths accompanied our hit on Noriega, whose crime was not that he was a drug dealer. He had long been a drug dealer, and a frequent recipient of large sums of CIA money, for many years prior to the U.S. invasion. His most likely crime was that he was inadequately obedient to Washington, D.C. as the date to turn over administration of the canal drew near (January 1, 1990). Noriega was ousted in December of 1989. There's an informative review of the civilian casualties from a host of U.S. military interventions here:

http://www.zmag.org/grossmanciv.htm

Now, I know war is not a tea party. But O'Reilly seems to think that we can ignore war crimes when the people committing them are flying the Red, White, and Blue. Maybe O'Reilly ought to do a little less preaching and a little more checking up on international law, particularly the parts that pertain to his inquiry, like the "Geneva Convention relative to the Protection of Civilian Persons in Time of War," whose Part I, Article 3 reads (http://193.194.138.190/html/menu3/b/92.htm):

"Persons taking no active part in the hostilities, including members of armed forces who have laid down their arms and those placed hors de combat by sickness, wounds, detention, or any other cause, shall in all circumstances be treated humanely, without any adverse distinction founded on race, colour, religion or faith, sex, birth or wealth, or any other similar criteria."

And O'Reilly might want to study a little U.S. history, while he's at it. Here's how he kicks off his McCarthy-esque rant:

"Robust debate is one of the things that has made this country great.

The Founding Fathers really went after each other during the forging of the Constitution, and sometimes the verbal rancor was frightening in its intensity.

But the Founders had common ground in that they believed in the concept of a free United States, and that individual rights were the key to that freedom.

Theirs was a labor of love, they all were proud to be called Americans."

Um, Bill? I have two words for you: chattel slavery.